


Waving Not Drowning

by CloudAtlas



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Spoilers, Female Friendship, Gen, POV Maria Hill, Post-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-26
Updated: 2016-07-26
Packaged: 2018-07-20 02:13:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7386613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CloudAtlas/pseuds/CloudAtlas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“To your left, Ms Hill,” comes Friday’s voice from nowhere and everywhere at once.</p><p>Maria looks to her left and sees a door which, she discovers as she approaches, leads to a room that looks more like a front room of a small New England family home than any room in a billionaires mansion. There’s a faded paisley couch, two green wingback chairs and a collection of other miscellaneous pieces of furniture that look old rather than antique.</p><p>She finds Pepper curled up on the couch.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Waving Not Drowning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tielan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tielan/gifts).



> I hope you like it tielan! <3 Title from... well, funny thing. Technically it's not from anything, I made it up. But actually I sort of got it from a remix of [Jose Gonzales' Crosses](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcKnlhL97rs). It was the [Peter Cat's Drowning Not Waving Remix](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3H2Kd5tuEs), the title probably taken from the Stevie Smith poem [Not Waving But Drowning](http://www.poetryfoundation.org/resources/learning/core-poems/detail/46479). But I just remembered it completely wrong. And now I love this version; _I may look out of my depth, but I'm coping. Hi_. 
> 
> Thank you to **geckoholic** for beta.

i.

“Does this mean you’re leaving?” Pepper asks down the phone.

Maria rubs her forehead with her thumb. She’s been working on rebuilding networks and laying groundwork for what feels like years because when Fury says jump, she jumps. It’s no surprise really; she was SHIELD before she was Stark Industries and she’s military down to her bones. Always has been, even if SHIELD wasn’t military and hadn’t been for decades. She understands the patterns and processes, more so than she’s ever understood Pepper’s world.

“I don’t know,” she replies eventually.

“This is going to change things,” Pepper says, and Maria would never say Pepper sounds pleading, but there’s something there; something she’s not heard before.

“They always change things.”

Pepper makes a noise of agreement, though Maria thinks that when she says ‘they’, Pepper hears ‘he’.

“I’d feel more comfortable,” Pepper says in her most diplomatic tone of voice, “if you stayed.”

Maria backs Fury’s play, almost always has. He has the distinction of not often being wrong, which is more than she could say for anyone she worked under in the Army. And even after this whole Ultron thing, even after that, Maria doesn’t think he’s wrong. There are dangers, sure, but there are dangers with everything and at least she trusts Steve Rogers’ morals and good sense, trusts Natasha and Barton. But that’s ‘they’. Pepper hears ‘he’.

“I didn’t change anything this time,” Maria says as gently as she can manage. “What difference do you think I’d make any other time?”

Maria recognises that both she and Pepper are women with more power than friends, something that doesn’t lend itself to concepts like ‘asking’. And Pepper Potts is too proud to beg.

But Maria likes Pepper and more power than friends doesn’t mean  _no_  friends, even if that friendship is tentative and fragile.

“I can’t promise anything,” Maria says into Pepper’s silence.

And Pepper says, “Thank you.”

 

ii.

In the end, Maria doesn’t leave. There’s no reason to, SHIELD being what it is now – split in two almost. The right hand knows not what the left hand does. Fury isn’t the visible hand as such – technically she’s that, as she’s not ‘dead’ – but a huge amount of the covert stuff, wheedling out Hydra and testing loyalties, is being carried out by Coulson’s merry band of misfits. Maria’s job is visible clean-up; visibly helping and visibly being good. A large neon statement of ‘we’ve got it right this time, trust us’.

Come to think of it, Fury’s the head, rather than either of the hands; the only one who knows everything. Maria’s only comfort is that it’s she, not Coulson, who occasionally gets shown both hands; it makes up for not having all that much to do. The world doesn’t really need another UN Peacekeeping force, probably wouldn’t trust one either, so her half of SHIELD is mostly superhero clean-up. And whatever people tell you, superheroes make far less of a mess than regular people. There’re less of them, for a start.

Plus, _someone_ has to stand up after the whole Sokovia debacle and lay claim to the Helicarrier no one knew existed and for obvious reasons, it wasn’t going to be Fury.

The Stark Industries position is easy, after that.

“I think I would have gone mad without this job,” Maria tells Pepper one evening.

Pepper smiles over her glass of wine. Maria was sort of surprised to be invited to drinks by Pepper, but it’s nice. It makes her think the word ‘friend’ isn’t such a stretch after all.

“Well I’m glad to have saved the world from that,” she replies. “I think a crazy Maria Hill would be very dangerous.”

Maria’s been given a slightly less nebulous job at Stark Industries after SHIELD came back into the picture. She still does ‘security’ independent to StarkSec, but Tony’s also given her insight into his team of decryption specialists who are sifting through the SHIELD/Hydra info dump. Due to the nature of how and why it came about, all but the very most sensitive data  _has_  to stay public, so Maria has been entrusted with deciding what that data is.

It’s not exactly interesting, but it keeps her brain ticking over. Makes her feel useful.

“The fact that I’m single makes so much more sense now,” Maria says, leaning back in her chair. “Either I’m at work or I’m going mad because I’m not at work.” She smiles across at Pepper. “I understand Tony a little better at least.” She takes a sip of her wine. “And I’m not even a genius.”

This time when Pepper smiles there’s something hidden in its corners. Something sad, maybe even brittle.

“You’re a different type of genius,” Pepper says.

“But just as difficult, I expect.”

Pepper doesn’t smile at that.

 

iii.

“How do you get someone to stop?”

Maria blinks once, then pulls her phone away from her face to squint at the screen.

“What?”

“How do you get – how can I make him  _stop_?”

Maria sits up in bed, this time squinting at her bedside clock. 03:42. Oh three forty two. Morning times are always military times.

“Pepper, wha – ? Who? Stop what? Pepper, are you alright?”

Maria feels fuzzy, the way you do when you’re woken from deep sleep. Normally she would be more articulate than this. Grace under pressure is her forte, dammit.

“He won’t – he won’t stop. I can’t get him to  _stop_.”

There’s a choked off sob from the other end of the line and Maria realises with horror that she’s become someone’s  _person_.

“I can’t  _worry_  this much, Maria. I just can’t. He said he’d stop. He got – he got rid of them all and then he” – another muffled sob – “he built a monster and – ”

There’s a long shuddering intake of breath and then silence.

“What are you telling me, Pepper?” Maria asks carefully.

“I can’t do this anymore.”

 

iv.

Maria has never been someone’s  _person_  before and of all the roles she’s ever had thrust upon her, this is the one she’s least prepared for.

Tony had given her a space in the Tower, but she had refused it. It’s still there, a complex of lonely, empty rooms, but Maria lives in a brownstone in Brooklyn Heights. She thinks Pepper only rang her because she’s far away enough for it to be safe.

Maria zips up her boots and slings on a coat. She might not be prepared for this, but she’s not shirking her duties either. She never has before and she’s not starting now, not when Pepper has decided to give her this trust. Pepper is a powerful woman who came to her position in an unusual way, unusual enough that people make  _assumptions_ , and as such she has few friends.

Maria knows what that feels like.

Lizhu is night security at the Tower tonight and Maria gives her a brief nod as she makes her way to the private elevators.

“Friday,” Maria asks as soon as the doors shut, “where is Ms Potts?”

Maria’s not sure she likes Friday. She had liked JARVIS, but then JARVIS had split in two – the yin and yang of AIs – becoming Vision, untouchable as the stars, and Ultron, Tony Stark’s worst nightmare. She can’t quite workout if those two beings have altered her opinions on AIs significantly enough that Friday is tainted by association or if she just finds it unsettling to have JARVIS so easily replaced. But whatever it is, she avoids interacting with Friday outside basic tasks.

Pepper doesn’t talk to Friday much either but Maria thinks Pepper’s reasons might be different to her own. She wonders if it’s to do with trust. Not trust in Friday though; trust in Tony.

“Ms Potts is in her private rec room,” Friday answers and her Irish lilt makes Maria miss JARVIS all over again.

“Am I authorised to enter?”

“Yes, Ms Hill,” Friday replies, slowing the elevator as it approaches Pepper’s floor.

The rec room is empty. Maria can’t decide what’s more likely; that Friday announced her arrival to Pepper and Pepper left, or that Friday was being wilfully misleading.

“To your left, Ms Hill,” comes Friday’s voice from nowhere and everywhere at once.

Maria looks to her left and sees a door which, she discovers as she approaches, leads to a room that looks more like a front room of a small New England family home than any room in a billionaires mansion. There’s a faded paisley couch, two green wingback chairs and a collection of other miscellaneous pieces of furniture that look old rather than antique.

She finds Pepper curled up on the couch.

“Pepper?” Maria says, trying not to seem too imposing as she leans over the back of the couch. ‘Gentle’ doesn’t come naturally to her, but she tries her best.

Pepper startles and jerks upright. Her eyes are red and she’s obviously been crying.

“Maria? What…?” She trails off and runs her hands through her hair. “What are you doing here?”

“You called,” Maria replies.

“It’s the middle of the night,” Pepper says faintly, her voice quiet and horse.

“Yet you called me.”

Maria moves around the couch, giving Pepper an inquiring look before sitting down. Pepper nods and tucks her feet further under herself, avoiding her eyes.

“What happened?” Maria asks when it’s clear that Pepper has no intention of breaking the silence.

“Tony’s at the compound,” Pepper says quietly, after a moment.

“I thought he’d retired.”

Pepper snorts, and there’s nothing that logically follows that so Maria doesn’t say anything.

“I can’t do this anymore,” Pepper says eventually.

She fiddles with the hem of the business skirt she’s still wearing before sighing and meeting Maria’s eyes for the first time since Maria turned up.

“No one knows this, but I have two jobs.”

Maria frowns at this, uncomprehending.

“One pays more than any amount of money I have even seen in my life, and one pays nothing. One has tens of thousands of people relying on me, and one has only one.”

Maria feels her frown smooth away. “One is not actually your job,” she points out.

“Of course it is,” Pepper replies bitingly. “Who the hell else is going to do it?”

“How about Tony himself?” Maria asks, discarding pretext.

Pepper’s eyes cut away and she doesn’t answer.

“You’re not Wonder Woman, Pepper. You can’t do everything. No one can.”

“Some people can,” Pepper says, uncharacteristically childish, and Maria lets the tone slide because it’s nearly five in the morning and Pepper is far stronger than she will ever acknowledge, even to herself.

“No,” she says, as gently as she can manage. “They can’t.” Pepper opens her mouth to say something, probably to provide examples, but Maria cuts her off. “And if you try and say I can, or Natasha can, or any of your frighteningly competent department heads can, I’m calling bullshit. There’s a limit to what one person can do, and there is a limit to how much one person  _should_  do. It’s not selfish to look after yourself.”

And isn’t that hypocritical of Maria? She’d work herself into an early grave if she was left to her own devices. She has so much she can do, so much she can help with and give herself to. The only reason she doesn’t is because people don’t let her; Fury and Natasha and Melinda and Sharon. Hell, even Barton. Even _Steve_. People who care enough about her to make sure she looks after herself.

Tony is a great guy, but Tony is too self-absorbed to notice that Pepper’s running herself into the ground making sure he’s okay. Pepper deserves better than that.

“I love him so much,” Pepper says, almost too quiet to hear.

Maria has never held too much stock in love. All examples of it that she’s ever see have seemed to hurt too much.

Maria is not the hugging type but she pulls Pepper towards her, wrapping her in a hug and ruthlessly tramping down her own feelings of discomfort.

“I know you do,” she replies.

 

v.

“Sometimes,” Pepper says conspiratorially one evening after Natasha had visited – updating them both on the progress of the new team, Barton’s many and sundry home improvement disasters and Steve’s on-and-off search for former Sargent James Buchanan Barnes – “Sometimes I’m so scared Natasha’s coming to tell me that he’s died.”

“They’ll look after him,” Maria says, though she’s well aware that for standards of ‘looking after’, people like Natasha Romanov are not the best barometers.

“They need him to be a superhero, I need him to be…”

Pepper trails off, and Maria doesn’t ask her to finish. The nebulous thing Pepper needs Tony to be probably includes things like ‘here’ and ‘better’ and they’re harder to attain than people think.

“When was the last time you talked to him?”

Something pulls tight in Pepper’s face and she shakes her head.

How did she fall into this position, Maria wonders, how did it happen that she cares so much?

“You need to talk to him.”

“So I can do what?” she says and it’s late enough that Pepper lets her hear the misery in her voice. “Break his heart?”

Maria curls her hand around Pepper’s shoulder. “He’s breaking yours.”

 

vi.

“Aren’t you supposed to be in Boston?” Maria asks as she enters the room. “I was told you’d be in Boston.”

She hasn’t seen Pepper in at least a month. Pepper’s been doing two week tours of various Stark Industries offices around the world and the last time she was Stateside, Maria was at the new SHIELD HQ in a recently abandoned pharmaceutical factory in Puerto Rico. It’s not glamorous but it  _is_  unexpected, and as the current Helicarrier spends a good portion of its time in the most inaccessible international waters for political reasons, it makes for a much more reasonable commute for most of her staff.

“I cancelled,” Pepper says shortly.

“Why?”

“I talked to Tony.”

Pepper wasn’t one to keep touch just for the sake of it – correspondences between the two tend to be either work related or to set up a dinner date – but since they last saw each other Maria had received three texts from Pepper that had nothing to do with work.

The first one said  _Tony’s supposed to be here and he’s not_ , which Maria later discovered was sent from Malibu.

The second was shorter and sent while Maria was in Puerto Rico. It read  _I wish I could speak to you._

Two days later it was followed by _You were wrong. This is what having your heart broken feels like._

Maria had got back to New York as soon as she could, but Friday informed her that Pepper still had another four days in Shanghai, and then two more in Dhaka before flying back to New York via London, and then on to Tony’s commencement speech at MIT. Maria had asked Friday to alert her as soon as Pepper was back in the Tower, which Maria had assumed would be tomorrow. But apparently not. 

Maria finds she’s getting used to Friday, slowly.

She studies Pepper for a moment; her smart clothes and flawless makeup not enough to hide the hurt lurking just below the surface.

“What happened?” Maria asks quietly.

She watches as Pepper attempts to draw around her the last remnants of Virginia Potts CEO, watches as Virginia Potts CEO tears like tissue-paper leaving only Pepper behind, her face reddening as she tries to hold back tears.

“We’re not – we’ve – ” but that’s as far as she gets before her entire face crumples, her shoulders curling in as sobs wrack her body.

She looks so small, sat crying on her faded paisley couch, and Maria is momentarily more terrified of the trust Pepper has suddenly placed in her than she has been of anything that has ever happened to her before. But it passes almost as soon as it arrives and Maria feels herself unfolding to wrap her arms around Pepper, drawing her close to rock her gently; echoing the mother Maria hardly remembers.

“Hey, hey,” Maria says quietly, patting Pepper on the back. She feels too big, too awkward, but Pepper clings to her like she’s her only lifeline and Maria doesn’t want to let her go.

“I told him – ” Pepper’s voice is so quiet that Maria can hardly hear it. It’s only the hot breath on her neck that even makes her aware she’s speaking at all. “I told him I couldn’t do this any” – Pepper’s breath hitches – “any more.”

There’s a long silence, and Pepper digs her nails into the back of Maria’s neck, her entire body betraying the fact that she’s forcing herself to speak.

“He looked like I’d ripped his heart out,” Pepper whispers.

Maria tightens her arms around her, the movement apparently breaking any hold Pepper had on her emotions because she dissolves into tears again.

She doesn’t really know what to say, has no idea what words could bring comfort in this kind of situation. She feels she’s too analytical, too used to looking at situations objectively and giving advice based on nothing more than the facts as they stand, to be of use to Pepper right now. Part of her wants to point out that this hurt will pass and that Pepper deserves better than a man who’s so wrapped up in his own head that he can’t even see when his actions are hurting those closest to him. But those observations, while true, aren’t helpful. And maybe Pepper _does_ deserve better, but love isn’t about deserving. Pepper doesn’t want better than Tony, she wants _Tony_ better. Maria may not understand what she sees in him, but that doesn’t matter.

So in lieu of saying anything, Maria shuffles until she can stretch out on Pepper’s paisley couch, tucking Pepper close and letting her actions speak the words her voice can’t say.

 

vii.

 _Friday?_ Maria texts.

She still finds it weird that she can text the Tower and that the Tower can reply. She might have preferred JARVIS – will probably always prefer JARVIS – but there is something to be said for the discretion of all Tony Stark’s AIs, outside of the fact that being discreet is not something you’d expect of anything built by Tony Stark.

 _Yes, Ms Hill?_ Friday replies in neat letters across the screen of her cell phone, the reply coming faster than it would from any human.

_Is Ms Potts available?_

Today is Maria’s first day off since she found out about Pepper and Tony. She’d worked through all her previous ones just to be in the Tower with Pepper. She didn’t think she should leave her alone for too long; you can’t really take personal days as a CEO and Maria was worried she’s just run herself into the ground. So she’s worked out of the data encryption offices, splitting her time between the remains of the SHIELD/Hydra data dump and harassing Pepper into eating meals at reasonable times. She was even joined by Natasha one day, who’s presence Maria is sure meant more to Pepper than she was able to articulate.

 _No, Ms Hill,_ comes Friday’s reply. _She’s in meetings all day._

Many of her old colleagues from SHIELD would probably have been mildly terrified if they’d seen Deputy Director Hill mother-henning anyone. But then again, many of her old colleagues from SHIELD were neo-Nazis, so fuck ‘em.

_Will you please ask Ms Potts to call me as soon as she can?_

And then, just to be sure, she sends, _Make sure she knows it’s not urgent._

 _Yes, Ms Hill_ , comes the reply.

 _Thank you, Friday_.

Maria looks down at the item nestled in the open box on her kitchen table; an elephant statue that Maria had admitted to liking when she and Pepper had gone out for dinner one evening. It’s a small thing, brightly coloured and probably cheaply made, wearing a faintly imploring expression. It had reminded Maria of her mother for some reason and Pepper had smiled when she’s mentioned that. But Maria had refused to buy it. It was pointless, she’d argued, and she’d have to carry it around with her for the rest of the day. For a small thing, it was surprisingly heavy.

That had been six weeks ago at least. Maria’s not sure what is more amazing; that Pepper went back to get it for her, or that it was still there when Pepper arrived.

There’s a card with the elephant; a cartoon moon and Earth stretching out arms to each other, the Earth saying ‘I love you’ and, the next panel over, people on beaches running and screaming as a tsunami wave approaches. It’s much more light-hearted than Maria would have ever expected from Pepper. But then, Maria never expected the paisley couch and green wingback chairs either.

She smiles at the card and goes to dig through her stack of cupcake recipe books. Pepper’s not the only one with hidden depths.

 

viii.

“You know,” Maria says conspiratorially late one night, hiccupping in the middle, “You know what?”

She and Pepper have spent the last however-many-hours discussing the implications of some information Maria had found in the SHIELD/Hydra data dump. But now they’ve moved on to the portion of the evening that involved more wine than is sensible, and it’s lead to Maria being far more verbose than she usually would be.

“What?” Pepper asks, smiling more easily than Maria has seen in a while.

“You’re like the sister I always wanted.”

Maria registers what she said only after the worlds left her mouth and she immediately buries her face in her hands. “Oh god wine, why?”

For a long time Pepper doesn’t say anything and when Maria finally looks up she finds Pepper’s got the strangest expression on her face; like she got stuck somewhere between hopeful, grateful and elated.

Pepper leans forward to put down her wineglass – nearly missing he table in the process – before shuffling inelegantly across the couch so she can wrap Maria in a hug.

“So are you,” she says softly into Maria’s hair.

 

ix.

Maria’s just about ready to put her fist through the wall when the call comes through. How can it be that US/Puerto Rican law is be _so infuriating_?

“Come down here and tell me if you think this looks legal.”

There’s something hard in Pepper’s voice that Maria hasn’t heard for a while and it’s that edge, more than anything else, which gets Maria moving.

Pepper is in her office on the forty-second floor, the large wall mounted TV showing WHIH rolling news. Her gaze is constantly shifting from frowning at the TV screen to frowning at her phone and back again.

“What is it?” Maria asks as soon as she enters.

“Look at that,” Pepper says, pointing at the TV, “and tell me what you think.”

_“…Secretary of State Thaddeus Ross said earlier today that the United States and the international community have a duty to protect people from the increased risk of ‘meta-human’ attacks.”_

Christine Everhart always looks so incredibly _plastic_ when she’s on TV, Maria thinks idly, and her teeth are so white. The image cuts from the WHIH studio to Secretary Ross conducting a press conference outside the UN Headquarters in New York.

_“The Accords provide a framework within which the United Nations can properly assess and evaluate threats of a meta-human nature. They provide security, oversight and accountability, something that to this date has been sorely lacking.”_

“Is that… is that _Tony_?” Maria asks, even though is it abundantly clear that _yes_ that is Tony Stark standing behind Secretary Ross.

“Yes,” Pepper says shortly, her mouth turned down at the corners. “Lucky Ross.”

Maria sends her a quizzical look, not quite understanding what she means by that, but Pepper ignores her so Maria lets it go.

“What _are_ these Accords?” she demands instead. “I know of no Accords. Is this the UN?”

“Apparently,” Pepper replies. “And they’re the Sokovia Accords. _Apparently_. Friday?”

Pepper looks in the vague direction of the ceiling, an automatic reaction to everyone but Tony. Hell, Maria does it all the time.

“Yes, Ms Potts?”

“Please find out all you can about these Sokovia Accords, going back as far as you’re able.”

“Yes, Ms Potts.”

Christine Everhart appears back on the TV screen

_“So far signatories include Iron Man’s Tony Stark and Colonel James Rhodes of the US Air Force, as well as the being known as ‘the Vision’. Secretary Ross says he hopes for all members of the so-called Avengers to sign the Accords, as a show of good-will and cooperation with the international community.”_

“Ms Potts?”

Friday’s voice cuts in on Christine Everhart’s continuing report and it’s only when Pepper immediately looks up that Maria realises that Pepper now interacts with Friday much as she did with JARVIS. Maybe it wasn’t about trust then. Maybe Pepper just missed JARVIS too.

“Yes, Friday?”

“There is no mention of the Sokovia Accords, or anything that could become the Sokovia Accords, before May 17th 2015.”

Maria sits up straighter at that information. “That’s under a year ago.”

“Indeed, Ms Hill,” Friday replies.

_“The Accords will be ratified in Vienna in three days’ time by 117 countries, including the usually recalcitrant nation of Wakanda, who lost 14 nationals in the Lagos attack.”_

“Three days’ time?” Maria asks incredulously. “You can’t write a treaty in less than a year and you definitely can’t ratify one in three days. What the hell is going on? And how has Tony got suckered into this?”

Maria takes out her phone and immediately calls the last number she has for Natasha, but an automated voice immediately comes through saying the number has been disconnected. She rolls her eyes and calls Steve instead, but he doesn’t pick up. She knows better than to ask Pepper if she’s tried to contact Tony – she’s not sure they’ve spoken for weeks and Maria can’t blame her – but in light of current events, Maria would feel better if she could get through to _any_ of the Avengers.

“I’m not delusional in thinking something fishy is going on here, right?” Pepper says as her fingers move, lightning-fast, over the screen of her phone. “I mean, my degree is in international corporate law but still, it seems pretty obvious to me.”

“You can say that again,” Maria mutters, sending off messages to various people both in Puerto Rico and on the Helicarrier. “Though how could _the UN_ be meeting for this if it’s such a shit-show? It’s highly suspect and someone has still managed to get representatives from 117 countries to sit in a room together.”

“Not to mention members of the Avengers.” Pepper drops her phone onto her desk before digging her thumb and forefinger into the bridge of her nose. “What have you done this time, Tony?” she asks quietly.

“Hey,” Maria moves quickly to drop a hand onto Pepper’s shoulder. “He’s not your responsibility anymore.”

“I can’t just _switch it off_ , Maria,” Pepper snaps.

There’s a tense silence, into which Christine Everhart prattles on about the next big story – trade negotiations within the AEC, apparently.

“Sorry,” Pepper says eventually. “I didn’t – I didn’t mean to snap at you.”

Maria squeezes her shoulder lightly. “It’s alright. I know I can be an insensitive ass sometimes.”

Pepper snorts lightly and lifts her head out of her hands. “What do we do?”

Maria shrugs.

“I don’t think there’s a lot we can do,” she replies. “I’m going to get hold of Fury, let him know, if he doesn’t already. See if there’s anything SHIELD should be doing, or if we can provide any help – indirectly, of course, probably through Natasha, or maybe Sharon, if people end up in Europe. And you should probably alert your legal team, seeing as a lot of the Avengers finances are tied to Stark Industries.”

She turns back to the TV, where WHIH are replaying portions of Secretary Ross’ press conference.

“But I tell you one thing,” Maria says with certainty, “there is something highly suspect about this entire thing and if Secretary Ross isn’t at the heart of it, he’s really fucking close.”

For a moment, they watch the news in silence, ticker tape banners with snappy one-liners and breaking news scrolling along the bottom of the screen as Christine Everhart’s plastic smile relays even the most devastating news in the same friendly tone.

“God,” Pepper says eventually. “I hope this doesn’t get worse.”

 

x.

In the aftermath of the UN bombing and Steve and Tony’s pissing match in the airport in Berlin, Maria has been ridiculously busy. She feels a little like someone’s mother; putting out fires she didn’t start and wants nothing to do with. Which is fine, it’s her job, but normally it’s aliens or secret societies or megalomaniacs that make the mess, not the self-proclaimed good guys. She was in the process of consolidating the current SHIELD employees into manageable units that could be trained and deployed effectively; something _sorely_ needed considering how depleted their numbers are now, but no. The Earth’s resident meta-humans had to go and have a disagreement, breaking several buildings in the process, and the world nominated SHIELD for clean-up because they have some serious bad karma they need to work off.

Maria feels like she’s not slept in at least three weeks. Fuck Fury for dumping this shit on her. He’s probably on some tropical island getting weird tan-lines on his head. (He’s probably not. In fact, she suspects he’s in Wakanda, but that still sounds _much more relaxing_ than what she’s currently doing.)

She’s just about ready to say ‘fuck it all’ and go home to sleep for a week when Pepper pops her head around Maria’s office door.

“Wow,” she says, smiling slightly, “You look like you need ten thousand naps.”

Maria glares at her and Pepper holds up a mug in supplication.

“I’ve brought coffee,” Pepper says. “Before you throw me out.”

Maria’s glare softens and she makes ‘gimme’ motions with her hands.

“Oh god, I’ve become Barton,” she says as Pepper hands over the mug. “Kill me now.”

Pepper snorts softly and sits on the edge of Maria’s desk. “I think me trying to kill you would be slow and painful thanks to a total lack of ability, but I can call Natasha if you still think it’s something you want.”

“Natasha's not picking up,” Maria says vaguely, inhaling the fortifying scent of coffee. “And anyway, can’t you just set me on fire?”

Pepper waggles her fingers at her.

“Nope,” she says, popping the ‘p’ in a way Maria would never have guessed she would. “I have no desire to be anything other than 100% human. Tony removed extremis on my request as soon as he could.”

“There’s always matches,” Maria replies with a smile.

“And get burn marks on this lovely desk? I don’t think so.”

Maria smiles, but she’s too tired to make it stick.

“Well, if you’re not here to help me rid myself of paperwork, why are you here?”

The tone is harsher than she intends, but Pepper ignores it with the grace of someone who worked for nearly twelve years as Tony Stark’s right hand.

“I want you to come with me to the compound.”

Maria frowns at Pepper suspiciously.

“Why?”

“Rhodey,” Pepper says simply. “He’s hurt and I haven’t gone to see him or even sent any kind of message. I mean, the only reason I even know it’s happened is because Friday told me.”

Maria nods then frowns again. She knew Friday had told Pepper what had happened – she’d informed Maria as soon as she’d found out – but Maria hadn’t realised quite what that meant. “Friday tells you about things that happen in the compound?”

“No,” Pepper says, reaching to fiddle with a corner of a quote from a large scale tarmac contractor and it’s depressing, Maria thinks idly, how much things have changed; before the SHIELD/Hydra reveal, Maria never had to deal with things as commonplace as _tarmac contractors_. “Friday runs here, Malibu, the compound and the Iron Man suits, but she doesn’t share information between sites unless it’s important.”

“Tony built an AI which won’t let him spy on you.”

“And won’t let me spy on him,” Pepper replies.

Maria doesn’t say anything to that.

“He’s a good person, Maria,” Pepper says quietly.

“I know,” Maria replies, putting her coffee down. “It’s half of why he’s so incredibly infuriating.”

Pepper’s smile is small. “Well, I can’t argue with that.”

They’re both silent for a moment and Maria begins drifting in a way that only happens when she’s been working for far, far too long. A blank static sort of buzz is taking over her brain, and she knows that if she doesn’t sleep soon, she’s going to crash in a way she hasn’t since New York. She’s almost forgotten what they were talking about when Pepper speaks again.

“Will you come with me then?” She looks hopeful in a way Maria can’t even begin to understand. “It’ll make a nice break for you, which I know you need.”

Maria tightens her hands around her coffee mug and wrenches her mind back into the here-and-now. It’s difficult, but Maria excels in difficult situations and this hardly ranks.

“Why do you – ?” She cuts herself off. “No. Better question; are you sure you’re going for Rhodey?”

The _are you sure you’re not going for Tony?_ is clear, unspoken as it is.

Pepper sighs, placing her hands back in her lap in a way that indicates what she’s about to say is important.

“Maria,” she says firmly. “I’m going for _me_. Rhodey is my friend, and I am an adult. I can deal with the fact that Tony is going to be there too.”

And through Maria’s tiredness she has a startling moment of clarity: Pepper and Tony will always circle one another, they will always be in each other’s orbit, and it would almost be self-destructive if it weren’t for the people each of them surrounds themselves with. Almost against her will, Maria’s been pulled into Tony Stark’s gravitational field, however tangentially, and she would be annoyed except Pepper is one of the best people she’s ever met. What is more, she’s one of the closest friends she’s ever had, and if the cost of that friendship is occasionally dealing with Pepper’s side of her strange relationship with Tony, then it’s a price she’s willing to pay. Especially as she’s well aware that dealing with Pepper’s side is magnitudes better dealing with Tony’s. Maria doesn’t envy James Rhodes at all.

“Okay,” she says.

“Okay?”

“Yeah, okay. I’ll come.”

Pepper studies her, as if looking for some physical tell as to why Maria suddenly just agreed, but Maria learnt her poker face from Natasha and Fury and she knows that even this tired, her face is inscrutable when she wants it to be.

And then Pepper smiles, small and quiet and honestly happy, and Maria is taken aback by the worry that falls from her frame. As if Maria agreeing suddenly made everything easier to face.

“Thank you, Maria.”


End file.
